"Bad Moon Rising"

COSMOLOGY

This months topic:

The Moon

(Last month's topic:)

(Black holes)

 

 

 

The moon is the best known heavenly object in the night sky. It is the brightest object in the sky besides the sun. The sun is what gives it its light, but meteors and comets are what cause its strange surface features. I have viewed the moon through a strong enough telescope to see the mountainous features that exist on the moon and would like to give you a little knowledge as to why the surface of the moon is the way it is. First, a little background on the moon.

 

The moon is a SATELLITE of the earth. It is approximately 238,860 miles away from the earth and is about 3,476 in diameter. It revolves around the earth in about 27 1/3 days, with a rotation period as the same. In other words, we always see the same side of the moon facing towards earth. The "dark side of the moon" is a misnomer, because the other side of the moon that we do not see is facing the sun during our NEW MOON phase. It is shined on for about 27 days then it goes into a 27-day nighttime. The size and distance of the moon are also responsible for the tides of the oceans. The moon, in conjunction with the sun cause the water in the seas to be gravitationally attracted to the moon, causing the sea level to rise where the moon is closest.

 

LUNA: The Earth's moon. Thanks NASA, and the education office of Ohio State. (SEE LINKS PAGE)

 

Now, the reason for the pounded look of the surface of the moon is a three-fold idea. First, the moon has no atmosphere and no weather to wear down the craters that are caused by meteors or comets or other space junk. On earth, the weather and winds cause mountains to erode over time and create a flatter look. The moon has no water so there are no oceans to wear away at a mountain either. Another reason is that it is in close proximity to the earth, meaning the earth's gravitational force sometimes acts as a magnet to space junk and the moon often gets in the way. These craters are not new, as most of them were created millions of years ago when there was much more space junk, but there are new ones created fairly often. The lack of an atmosphere leaves it wide open for constant barrages of meteorites. They will not burn up as they do in the atmosphere of the earth. The last reason is that both the earth and the moon are in relatively close proximity to the sun, about 90,000,000 miles. This reasoning is similar to the close proximity of the moon to the earth. The gravity of the sun causes space junk to be pulled toward it, and the earth and moon often are in the way.

 

The craters formed on the surface are what give it its look. The early meteorites (as well as asteroids, comets, etc.) slammed into the surface of the moon. At one time, the moon had a molten core that spewed lava on to the surface after a deep impact. This left a smooth looking surface on the moon that looked like lakes. As a matter of fact, the early astronomers thought that was exactly what they were: lakes made of water. However, we now know that this is not true, but we have kept the names of these areas, such as the sea of tranquility (the area the first Apollo mission landed). The mountainous regions are where the creators are. Some like the Stevinus crater can be seen with the naked eye. Others are very well defined just by using a set of binoculars. A telescope will bring out the grandest features of the moon.

 

Now, how did the moon get there? There are several theories that no one has yet proven or disproved. So far, the one that most agree on is that the moon was once part of the earth, and a huge celestial object smashed into the earth causing a part of it to tear away into another object. This object was still close enough to the earth to stay in its orbit. However, this article, by Inside Denver (Colorado) states that the moon may have been created by debris surrounding the earth that melded together to form the moon, and that it was much closer in the sky than it is now. The moon is moving away from the earth every year by a couple of inches. At some point, it will leave our orbit altogether and either be captured by another planet, gain its own rotation around the sun, or fall into the sun. There are other theories such as one that suggests that it was its own planet for a while that the earth just gained as its own satellite.

 

Is the earth the only planet with a moon? As you probably know, or could guess anyway, the answer is, of course, no. Mars for instance has two moons. They are named Phobos and Diemos. Jupiter has 16 known planets and the listing of these moons are listed HERE. As you can see, there are many moons within the solar system. Even Pluto has one. In fact, there is a probe on its way to the largest moon in the solar system, Titan. The name of the probe is the CASSINI space probe (thanks REUTERS). This moon has a substantial atmosphere that interests scientists to search for answers about the moon. We should know something in the year 2004 or 2005.

 

As far as our own moon, the last time we landed on it was in 1972 (coincidentally the year I was born). We seem to have a growing interest to return to the lunar surface, however the reasons behind it are different now. Before, we wanted to find out the feasibility of putting a lunar station on the moon. If we go back, it will be to see about mining it for our purposes here on earth. "They" are just talking about it now, and it seems that they are focussing on trying to get someone to the red planet, Mars, first.

 

So what is it that they are interested in to mine? Well, there seems to be a bit of minerals and ores that could be useful here on earth. The core of the moon is made of iron, though not like the earth's core, and there have been samples of magnesium, and silica that we would love to grab. The problem, of course is the cost to get these materials compared to the payoff of mining these materials. It may cost too much to bother. Here is another site to visit explaining how to make glass on the lunar surface :

 

One last thing. There are some wild myths about the moon, especially about the full moon. I want you to think about this: The moon is the same size, the same distance, and the same material no matter what phase the moon is in. The full moon is simply reflecting light back from the sun, which is on the opposite side of the earth than the moon is. It is not creating more gravity, it is not a different material, and it does not physically create any new forces on the mind other than what people believe it does. Why wouldn't people go absolutely nuts if the moon was on the same side of the moon (new moon phase) where the gravitational pull would be greatest? So, you can see that the myth of the full moon making people go crazy is just that, a myth.

CLICK on the image at left to learn about the upcoming missions to the moon to learn even more.

CLICK on the image at left to get updates on the current LUNAR PROSPECTOR mission.

Coming next month....

The Oort Cloud and the Kupier Belt. What are they doing outside of Pluto???

 

Eric Tallberg
Feb. 1998

Click on the logo and learn about Jet Propulsion at the NASA JPL instructional site.

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